The 25 Best Gay Movies of All Time
by malthe-tuxen | created - 11 Jul 2017 | updated - 3 months ago | PublicThe 25 best LGBT movies of all time. (in my opinion)
Honorable Mentions:
Rocketman (2019)
Bohemian Rhapsody (2018)
Tangerine (2015)
The Danish Girl (2015)
Beginners (2010)
The Crying Game (1992)
A Special Day (1977)
Midnight Cowboy (1969)
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1. Mulholland Drive (2001)
R | 147 min | Drama, Mystery, Thriller
After a car wreck on Mulholland Drive renders a woman amnesiac, she and a Hollywood-hopeful search for clues and answers across Los Angeles in a twisting venture beyond dreams and reality.
Director: David Lynch | Stars: Naomi Watts, Laura Harring, Justin Theroux, Jeanne Bates
Votes: 384,084 | Gross: $7.22M
2. American Beauty (1999)
R | 122 min | Drama
A sexually frustrated suburban father has a mid-life crisis after becoming infatuated with his daughter's best friend.
Director: Sam Mendes | Stars: Kevin Spacey, Annette Bening, Thora Birch, Wes Bentley
Votes: 1,211,518 | Gross: $130.10M
3. Brokeback Mountain (2005)
R | 134 min | Drama, Romance
Ennis and Jack are two shepherds who develop a sexual and emotional relationship. Their relationship becomes complicated when both of them get married to their respective girlfriends.
Director: Ang Lee | Stars: Jake Gyllenhaal, Heath Ledger, Michelle Williams, Randy Quaid
Votes: 382,491 | Gross: $83.04M
4. Call Me by Your Name (2017)
R | 132 min | Drama, Romance
In 1980s Italy, romance blossoms between a seventeen-year-old student and the older man hired as his father's research assistant.
Director: Luca Guadagnino | Stars: Timothée Chalamet, Armie Hammer, Michael Stuhlbarg, Amira Casar
Votes: 316,202 | Gross: $18.10M
5. The Handmaiden (2016)
Not Rated | 145 min | Drama, Romance, Thriller
A woman is hired as a handmaiden to a Japanese heiress, but secretly she is involved in a plot to defraud her.
Director: Park Chan-wook | Stars: Kim Min-hee, Ha Jung-woo, Cho Jin-woong, Moon So-ri
Votes: 172,953 | Gross: $2.01M
6. Milk (I) (2008)
R | 128 min | Biography, Drama, History
The story of American gay activist Harvey Milk, who fought for gay rights and was elected as California's first openly gay official.
Director: Gus Van Sant | Stars: Sean Penn, Josh Brolin, Emile Hirsch, Diego Luna
Votes: 179,879 | Gross: $31.84M
7. Capote (2005)
R | 114 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
In 1959, Truman Capote learns of the murder of a Kansas family and decides to write a book about the case. While researching for his novel In Cold Blood, Capote forms a relationship with one of the killers, Perry Smith, who is on death row.
Director: Bennett Miller | Stars: Philip Seymour Hoffman, Clifton Collins Jr., Catherine Keener, Allie Mickelson
Votes: 140,824 | Gross: $28.75M
8. Pain and Glory (2019)
R | 113 min | Drama
A film director reflects on the choices he's made in life as the past and present come crashing down around him.
Director: Pedro Almodóvar | Stars: Antonio Banderas, Asier Etxeandia, Leonardo Sbaraglia, Nora Navas
Votes: 63,156
9. Carol (2015)
R | 118 min | Drama, Romance
An aspiring photographer develops an intimate relationship with an older woman in 1950s New York.
Director: Todd Haynes | Stars: Cate Blanchett, Rooney Mara, Sarah Paulson, Kyle Chandler
Votes: 142,458 | Gross: $12.71M
10. Dog Day Afternoon (1975)
R | 125 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
Three amateur bank robbers plan to hold up a bank. A nice simple robbery: Walk in, take the money, and run. Unfortunately, the supposedly uncomplicated heist suddenly becomes a bizarre nightmare as everything that could go wrong does.
Director: Sidney Lumet | Stars: Al Pacino, John Cazale, Penelope Allen, Sully Boyar
Votes: 273,184 | Gross: $50.00M
11. Moonlight (I) (2016)
R | 111 min | Drama
A young African-American man grapples with his identity and sexuality while experiencing the everyday struggles of childhood, adolescence, and burgeoning adulthood.
Director: Barry Jenkins | Stars: Mahershala Ali, Naomie Harris, Trevante Rhodes, Alex R. Hibbert
Votes: 332,049 | Gross: $27.85M
12. Portrait of a Lady on Fire (2019)
R | 122 min | Drama, Romance
On an isolated island in Brittany at the end of the eighteenth century, a female painter is obliged to paint a wedding portrait of a young woman.
Director: Céline Sciamma | Stars: Noémie Merlant, Adèle Haenel, Luàna Bajrami, Valeria Golino
Votes: 109,730 | Gross: $3.76M
13. A Single Man (2009)
R | 99 min | Crime, Drama, Romance
An English professor, one year after the sudden death of his boyfriend, is unable to cope with his typical days in 1960s Los Angeles.
Director: Tom Ford | Stars: Colin Firth, Julianne Moore, Matthew Goode, Nicholas Hoult
Votes: 117,796 | Gross: $9.17M
14. Show Me Love (1998)
Not Rated | 89 min | Comedy, Drama, Romance
Two teenage girls in small-town Sweden. Elin is beautiful, popular, and bored with life. Agnes is friendless, sad, and secretly in love with Elin.
Director: Lukas Moodysson | Stars: Alexandra Dahlström, Rebecka Liljeberg, Erica Carlson, Mathias Rust
Votes: 55,411 | Gross: $0.17M
15. God's Own Country (2017)
Not Rated | 104 min | Drama, Romance
Spring. Yorkshire. Young farmer Johnny Saxby numbs his daily frustrations with binge drinking and casual sex, until the arrival of a Romanian migrant worker for lambing season ignites an intense relationship that sets Johnny on a new path.
Director: Francis Lee | Stars: Josh O'Connor, Alec Secareanu, Gemma Jones, Ian Hart
Votes: 35,583 | Gross: $0.34M
16. Heavenly Creatures (1994)
R | 99 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
Two teenage girls share a unique bond; their parents, concerned that the friendship is too intense, separate them, and the girls take revenge.
Director: Peter Jackson | Stars: Melanie Lynskey, Kate Winslet, Sarah Peirse, Diana Kent
Votes: 67,429 | Gross: $3.05M
17. And Your Mother Too (2001)
R | 106 min | Drama
In Mexico, two teenage boys and an older woman embark on a road trip and learn a thing or two about life and each other.
Director: Alfonso Cuarón | Stars: Maribel Verdú, Gael García Bernal, Daniel Giménez Cacho, Ana López Mercado
Votes: 128,916 | Gross: $13.62M
18. Mysterious Skin (2004)
Unrated | 105 min | Drama
Two pre-adolescent boys both experienced a strange event and later it affects their lives in different ways. One becomes a reckless, sexually adventurous prostitute, while the other retreats into a reclusive fantasy of alien abduction.
Director: Gregg Araki | Stars: Brady Corbet, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Elisabeth Shue, Chase Ellison
Votes: 76,350 | Gross: $0.70M
19. Philadelphia (1993)
PG-13 | 125 min | Drama
When a man with HIV is fired by his law firm because of his condition, he hires a homophobic-small time lawyer as the only willing advocate for a wrongful dismissal suit.
Director: Jonathan Demme | Stars: Tom Hanks, Denzel Washington, Roberta Maxwell, Buzz Kilman
Votes: 258,213 | Gross: $77.32M
20. Boys Don't Cry (1999)
R | 118 min | Biography, Crime, Drama
A young man named Brandon Teena navigates love, life, and being transgender in rural Nebraska.
Director: Kimberly Peirce | Stars: Hilary Swank, Chloë Sevigny, Peter Sarsgaard, Brendan Sexton III
Votes: 103,327 | Gross: $11.53M
21. The Perks of Being a Wallflower (2012)
PG-13 | 103 min | Drama
Charlie, a 15-year-old introvert, enters high school and is nervous about his new life. When he befriends his seniors, he learns to cope with his friend's suicide and his tumultuous past.
Director: Stephen Chbosky | Stars: Logan Lerman, Emma Watson, Ezra Miller, Paul Rudd
Votes: 548,305 | Gross: $17.74M
22. The Imitation Game (2014)
PG-13 | 114 min | Biography, Drama, Thriller
During World War II, the English mathematical genius Alan Turing tries to crack the German Enigma code with help from fellow mathematicians while attempting to come to terms with his troubled private life.
Director: Morten Tyldum | Stars: Benedict Cumberbatch, Keira Knightley, Matthew Goode, Allen Leech
Votes: 825,459 | Gross: $91.13M
23. Love, Simon (2018)
PG-13 | 110 min | Comedy, Drama
Simon Spier keeps a huge secret from his family, his friends and all of his classmates: he's gay. When that secret is threatened, Simon must face everyone and come to terms with his identity.
Director: Greg Berlanti | Stars: Nick Robinson, Jennifer Garner, Josh Duhamel, Katherine Langford
Votes: 125,958 | Gross: $40.83M
24. Dallas Buyers Club (2013)
R | 117 min | Biography, Drama
In 1985 Dallas, electrician and hustler Ron Woodroof works around the system to help AIDS patients get the medication they need after he is diagnosed with the disease.
Director: Jean-Marc Vallée | Stars: Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Garner, Jared Leto, Steve Zahn
Votes: 519,558 | Gross: $27.30M
25. Blue Is the Warmest Colour (2013)
NC-17 | 180 min | Drama, Romance
Adèle's life is changed when she meets Emma, a young woman with blue hair, who will allow her to discover desire and to assert herself as a woman and as an adult. In front of others, Adèle grows, seeks herself, loses herself, and ultimately finds herself through love and loss.
Director: Abdellatif Kechiche | Stars: Léa Seydoux, Adèle Exarchopoulos, Salim Kechiouche, Aurélien Recoing
Votes: 163,138 | Gross: $2.20M
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